Profile: SFO director Richard Alderman

The head of the SFO is in many ways a surprising man to be locked in a public power struggle with one of Britain's most powerful corporations.

Richard Alderman, 56, is not the sort of alpha male who can command a room. He is quietly spoken and far from flamboyant. However, assisted by a £180,000-a-year public relations officer, Sam Jaffa, he has sought to project an image of toughness since he took over the SFO in April last year.

He would have been pleased by a flattering profile of him in a tabloid last month. It compared him with Eliot Spitzer, the US prosecutor known as the "Sheriff of Wall Street", and warned big business that "a tough and tenacious sheriff" was coming after them if they stepped out of line.

Before the SFO, he was a senior investigator at Revenue and Customs in charge of specialised tax inquiries.